


all this, and love too, will ruin us

by callypso



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Ficlet, post existence/essence, this is a ficlet really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-12
Updated: 2015-07-12
Packaged: 2018-04-08 21:52:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4322070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callypso/pseuds/callypso
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>post existence/essence angst. a ficlet about goodbyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	all this, and love too, will ruin us

it is that night, as they are curled together nose to nose, their foreheads just barely touching, that he tells her, quietly, he has chosen a day to leave. 

her heart constricts. it's too soon, she wants to say, i can't lose you like this, not now, and william, oh god, william—

but what can she tell him that he doesn't already know, that he hasn't already considered, that she doesn't already see in his eyes when he looks at their son, his knuckles white on the wooden bars of the crib and his whole body poised on the verge of shattering? 

scully, he says, carefully, but she isn't listening, she is pressing her face into the pillow because she knows what comes next and she wishes she didn't, she wishes this were a different year or a different age and they were two different people with a son they could raise and a home they keep and just one small, bright place where they could hold each other without fear of their peace dissolving.

when he says her name a second time she almost does not hear him, her mind is still floating untethered, miles away, but there is something odd in the timbre of his voice this time and it is only when she opens her eyes and looks at him, really looks at him, that she realizes he is crying. 

the pleading words, the careful rationalizations, all of them die in her throat. she raises her hand to brush away his tears, aching to somehow put words to the fresh heaviness hanging between them, but he catches her fingers and presses them hard to his lips and she feels something in her chest swelling, breaking. 

where will you go? she asks softly. and she knows that he can't say or won't say but always, always she needs to hear him tell her so. 

instead, he takes her hand and covers it with his until their fingers are tangled so tightly together that she can just feel the ghostly flutter of his pulse and, gently, gently, he presses her hand (his hand?) to her heart. 

here, he whispers, finally, in a voice like stars collapsing. i'll be right here.


End file.
